A good tour from Circa, not just re: Google: "Google ... will spend $150 million this year on a "far-reaching campaign" to improve the diversity of the technology industry... the technology industry "cannot be this homogeneous" if it intends to build products for a global marketplace."... Co-founders ... tasked the company in 2013 with doing…

Business-focused, but a lot of clear thinking for government communicators as well. Particularly like: "Certainly we have more conversations with more people but is that a sign of success? ... Until social media marketers get over themselves, and businesses start to integrate online conversations – and the tools and people that manage them …

Because "lo-fi" audiovisual is no longer the preserve of the deep-pocketed, and podcasts really should be on your ThinkAbout list: "For the best recordings on a budget, check out this list of tips and tools for the budding podcaster." - Podcasting On A Budget: How To Record Great Audio For Less - ReadWrite

"the whole point of digital transformation is realizing that technology fundamentally changes how you do business in just about every way. It therefore poses very difficult questions to business and technology leaders: Who best should do our work today? Where does the value come from? What do these new ways of working actually look like? How c…

To be rolled out next time someone wants to "skip the analyses and wireframes - just give us the mockups": "An interface's visual hierarchy relies on the same principles of aesthetics used by the Renaissance masters, but on top of that (or rather beneath it) there's the subtext of secondary goals - promoting specific content, encouraging user…

I totally see myself in this excellent post: "it genuinely feels like the act of deciding is ruining my life. Even with low-stakes decisions, I feel viscerally bound to weigh every possible outcome to ensure that I’m making the best choice. Sounds responsible, right? Maybe. But it also feels like I’m trapped by my own compulsion to not fuck up …

"Whether you’re selling a product or service, the ubiquitous product video can be the make-or-break moment... At Vimeo, we’ve seen our fair share... Here are some rules for product videos and some examples of people who do it well"

"The rise of open data, crowd-sourcing, predictive analytics, and other big tech trends, aren't just for companies to contend with. They're also a challenge for government. New technology gives public agencies the opportunity to develop and deliver services in new ways, track results more accurately, and open up decision-making. Deloitte's big ne…

The impact autonomous cars will have on personal mobility and cities will dwarf the disruption Uber and AirBnB have wrought on their respective industries. Joined-up European policies seem in short supply

"self-driving, shared “taxibots” ... could eliminate 90% of cars on the roads, open up acres of land and slash commute times ... completely obviate the need for traditional public transport." - How Self-Driving Cars Could Radically Transform Cities - ReadWrite

"A Columbia University study suggested that with a fleet of just 9,000 autonomous cars, Uber could replace every taxi cab in New York City13 – passengers would wait an average of 36 seconds for a ride that costs about $0.50 per mile.14 Such convenience and low cost will make car ownership inconceivable, and autonomous, on-demand taxis – the ‘trans…

"Humanity has no choice but to go electric if it wants to maintain a lifestyle dependent on motor vehicles... Europe is lagging behind the USA. It has put too much trust in its efficient diesel engines that consume no more fuel than comparable hybrid vehicles and are less expensive." - Electric Vehicles are the Future | Rhein on Energy and Clima…

"... researchers in the field of human factors—experts on how people interact with machines—have shown that we shouldn’t ignore the human element of automated driving... When machines take over, the work required of the human is typically not remove... Rather, the job becomes different... require designing new, innovative ways to keep the drive…

"the “new mobility”... cities in which residents no longer rely on their cars but on public transport, shared cars and bikes and, above all, on real-time data on their smartphones. ... transform not just transport but the cities themselves ... rebalance the public space and create a city for people ... less pollution, less noise, less stress... a …

"In October 2010 ... Google's fleet of self-driving cars had already collectively traversed some 140,000 miles of California asphalt... Last year, a BMW drove itself down the Autobahn, from Munich to Ingolstadt ... Audi sent an autonomous vehicle up Pikes Peak...n November, Toyota unveiled its Prius AVOS (Automatic Vehicle Operation System), whi…

"Imagining a future without lights and stop signs.... driverless cars will make intersections much more efficient. Right now, you may wind up sitting at a red light for 45 seconds even though no one is passing through the green light in the opposite direction. But you don’t have to do that in a world where traffic flows according to computer comm…

"Now Sandberg is skewing younger. On Friday, Facebook announced a partnership with LinkedIn, LeanIn.org and the Anita Borg Institute to form Circles aimed at women studying computer science or engineering."

"...a new ecosystem of content promotion has arisen to fill the visibility hole left by the unfulfilled promises of organic search and social media. The channels and tactics for content promotion are advancing, affecting everything from influencer outreach and media relations to native advertising and sponsored content." - The Content Marketing E…

"The story of podcasts suddenly being “back” strongly suggests, and mostly requires, that they had been big at one time and had since gone away. That New York Magazine article even cites a “bottom” time: 2010. But that never really happened." - Why podcasts are suddenly “back” – Marco.org

"Switzerland, Iceland, Denmark and Norway are the world's happiest countries, according to the 2015 World Happiness Report, ... Bringing countries together in a big bloc such as the EU doesn't help increase social capital. And when some countries in such a union do worse than others, their social fabric rips in a dramatic way, trust erodes and th…

" Top tasks are the small set of tasks ... that matter most to your customers. Make these tasks work well, and you’ll be on the right track. Get them wrong, and chances are you’ll lose the customer. Top Tasks Management is a model that says: “Focus on what really matters (the top tasks) and defocus on what matters less (the tiny tasks).” Tiny ta…

This is NOT just about gender equality! Sure, it starts as such: "The more we look into the cognitive basis of team and business performance, the more we learn about the strengths of women relative to men..." But look: "... Teams with higher average I.Q.s didn’t score much higher on our collective intelligence tasks than did teams w…

An array of sophisticated language technologies could help ideas flow across EU borders, link national conversations together and support the EU Online Public Sphere - the demos the EU needs. But BloggingPortal is unlikely to feature them. [update (17/5/15): I finally decided to kick Medium's tyres by reposting this there, with less history. …

Great "best of times, worst of times" piece on storytelling. Not just worth a read, it's worth learning the formula. An example: "Our access to knowledge and stories has never been greater, and it’s growing every day.... "21 things only a 90s kid can appreciate” will probably get 50 times more traffic than a post about climate change or political…

A really good perspective on the various "Women in IT" initiatives and how some actually make it harder, not easier: "I can’t get behind the idea that we are looking for good, sweet girls to turn into programmers. We belong in this field because we’re people who deserve a shot, not because we are geniuses. We don’t deserve to be in this industry …

"content-sharing deal between the BBC and regional newspapers ... BBC’s local news websites display links to stories carried by participating titles in the area. The newspapers themselves are free to choose which stories they want to be linked from the BBC’s ‘Local Live’ web feed, which updates readers on breaking news throughout the day." - BB…

"In a time of unprecedented challenge, leaders don't just need to lead their companies. They also need to lead themselves. They need strategies for improving their effectiveness while sustaining a sense of professional well-being... In order to survive and thrive, leaders can't just go about business as usual. Business isn't "usual" anymore. It's …

"Les Echos 360 is separate from our flagship site LesEchos.fr, the digital version of the French business daily Les Echos... it is an aggregation and filtering system ... the kernel from which many digital products and extensions we have in mind will spring... we need to be the very core of business information... Readers trust the content we pro…

"Here's how Blendle works: Users register for Blendle and put in their credit-card details just once at the beginning of the process in which they create a newsfeed of stories about the topics in which they are interested. When they click on a headline, the app/website takes a small payment. And — perhaps the most intriguing part of the whole offe…

"3M – the company that makes Ace bandages, Scotchgard, and Post-it notes... is succeeding on Twitter.... This is not Beyonce or Lady Gaga. 3M is not political. There are no professional NBA employees employed by the company... And yet 121,000 people follow it. " - Boring Brands Can Crush Social Media...And 5 Other Things You Can Learn From 3M -…